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 @MercifulFr33m4rke…NewsimmigrationDrug Trafficking PenaltiesDaily DiscussionKILLEDPolicePublicMexican Drug CartelsMexico•••10mos ago

Mexican Drug Cartels Expand Under "Hugs, Not Bullets" Policy

Gangs affiliated with Mexico’s two largest drug cartels—battling to the death over market share—have grown in number and influence since President Andrés Manuel López Obrador took office in 2018. He eased up under a policy he called “hugs, not bullets.” Arrests by Mexico’s national guard, created under López Obrador to replace federal police, fell to 2,800 in 2022 from 21,700 in 2018, according to the national statistics agency.

More than 200 criminal gangs are engaged in turf wars compared with 76 in 2010, according to the International Crisis Group, a Brussels-based think tank that studies violent conflicts worldwide. Most of the disputes involve the Sinaloa or Jalisco cartels, among the world’s largest criminal organizations and the top traffickers of fentanyl—the low-cost, high-margin synthetic opioid that kills tens of thousands of Americans a year.

Criminal gangs behind the U.S. drug epidemic are seeing accelerated growth, commanding greater control over more territory in Mexico, where they are largely free to murder rivals, neuter police, seize property and strong-arm municipalities into giving them public contracts.

In December, farmers from a village in the state of Mexico attacked local cartel members with machetes and sickles, revolting against demands they each pay as much as $600 to work their own land, authorities said. The fight killed 10 gang members and four farmers.

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 @ISIDEWITHasked…10mos10MO

Do you think a 'hugs, not bullets' approach can effectively combat violence and criminal organizations, and why?

 @ISIDEWITHasked…10mos10MO

How would you feel living in a community where criminal gangs have more power than the local police?

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 @ISIDEWITH submitted…1mo1MO

Vetting Fiasco: Trump's Defense Pick Caught in Sexual Assault Allegation Storm

CNN commentator and New York Times reporter Maggie Haberman said President-elect Donald Trump’s team missed Pete Hegseth’s payoff to a sexual assault accuser when they vetted him to be secretary of defense.Hegseth is among a raft of cabinet picks facing tough confirmations, and who aren’t being subjected to the customary FBI checks, instead being vetted by private firms. Over the weekend, Hegseth’s attorney dropped the bomb that there was a confidential settlement with a woman who accused the former Fox News host of sexual assault. On Monday night’s edition of CNN’s The Source with Kaitlan Collins, Haberman revealed that her sources in Trump world did not know about the payoff, which was missed in the vetting “because it was a private settlement”HABERMAN: There’s more concern from some people around Trump than there is from Trump himself, about this whole issue. Trump has really dug in, and has told advisers that he is going to stick with Hegseth. Now, we’ll see if anything else emerges.They did do a vet, we are told. This did not show up, this issue, because it was a private settlement, according to the people, who were briefed on what took place. Trump really likes Pete Hegseth. But this did introduce the thing Trump doesn’t like, which is an element of surprise and a negative headline. And so, we will see where this goes.

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 @ISIDEWITH submitted…2mos2MO

Inside the Podcast Revolution: Trump’s Unfiltered Strategy and Harris’s ‘Meltdown’ Risk

Tech billionaire Elon Musk attributed President-elect Trump’s election victory, at least in part, to the lengthy podcast interviews he did during the campaign.In an interview late Tuesday with former Fox News host Tucker Carlson, Musk said Trump’s podcast appearances showed the American public that he was a normal person.“I think it made a big difference that President Trump and soon-to-be Vice President Vance went on lengthy podcasts,” Musk said in the interview.“I think this really makes a difference because people look at, like, Joe Rogan’s podcast, which is great, and Lex Fridman’s and the All-In podcast, and, you know, to a reasonable-minded, smart person — who’s not, like, hardcore one way or the other — they just listen to someone talk for a few hours and that’s how they decide whether, you know, you’re a good person, whether they like you,” he added, according to a clip highlighted by Mediaite.Trump conducted many interviews with new media during his campaign, as well as with legacy news organizations such as Fox News.Last month, he joined Joe Rogan’s podcast for a 3-hour long interview. The celebrity host later endorsed his candidacy.His opponent, Vice President Harris, did not appear on Rogan’s podcast because, according to “The Joe Rogan Experience” host, the Harris campaign only had an hour and required him to travel to her. Rogan said he felt “strongly” that the “best way to do” an interview with the vice president would have been in his studio in Austin, Texas.Musk recalled posting on his social platform X account that “nothing would do more damage” to Harris’s campaign than going on Rogan’s podcast, “because she would run out of non-sequiturs after about 45 minutes.”“You can’t hide for three hours,” Carlson replied.Musk added, “Yeah, like, hour two and three would be a complete melted puddle of nonsense. So it would just be absolute game over. That’s why she didn’t go on.”“But on the other hand, Trump, he’s there, and there’s no, there’s no talking points,” the Tesla CEO continued. “He’s just being a normal person who’s having a conversation, and doing three hours of Rogan, no problem.”

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 @ISIDEWITH submitted…7 days7D

Defense Bill Blocks Transgender Care To Minors

The Senate on Wednesday gave final approval to a defense policy bill directing $895 billion toward the Pentagon and other military activities, moving over the objections of some Democrats who opposed a provision added late in the negotiations that would deny coverage for transgender health procedures for minors.The 85-to-14 vote, coming a week after a divided House passed the same measure, cleared the bill for President Biden’s signature.Most Republicans and many Democrats supported the measure, which provides a 14.5 percent pay raise to junior enlisted service members and a 4.5 percent pay raise for all other service members. It also expands access to meal assistance, housing and child care programs that benefit those in uniform.But several Democrats withheld their backing in protest of a provision preventing TRICARE, the military’s health care plan for service members, from covering “medical interventions for the treatment of gender dysphoria that could result in sterilization” for children under 18.The language, which would affect the gender-transitioning children of service members, was recently added to the measure at the insistence of Speaker Mike Johnson, Republican of Louisiana, who refused to bring a defense bill to the House floor without it, according to aides familiar with the negotiations.Twenty-one Democrats, led by Senator Tammy Baldwin of Wisconsin, proposed an amendment to strip the provision from the bill, but the matter was never brought to a vote. Several of them took to the floor on Tuesday to lodge their objections.“It’s flat-out wrong to put this provision in this bill and take away a service member’s freedom to make that decision for their families,” Ms. Baldwin said, estimating that the provision could negatively affect as many as 6,000 to 7,000 military families.

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